Cross‐phytogroup assessment of foliar epiphytic mycobiomes

Abstract

Summary The foliar surface forms one of the largest aboveground habitats on Earth and maintains plant‐fungus relationships that greatly affect ecosystem functioning. Despite many studies with particular plant species, the foliar epiphytic mycobiome has not been studied across a large number of plant species from different taxa. Using high‐throughput sequencing, we assessed epiphytic mycobiomes on leaf surfaces of 592 plant species in a botanical garden. Plants of angiosperms, gymnosperms, and pteridophytes were involved. Plant taxonomy, leaf side, growing environment, and evolutionary relationships were considered. We found that pteridophytes showed the higher fungal species diversity, stronger mutualistic fungal interactions, and a greater percentage of putative pathogens than gymnosperms and angiosperms. Plant taxonomic group, leaf side, and growing environment were significantly associated with the foliar epiphytic mycobiome, but the similarity of the mycobiomes among plants was not directly related to the distance of the host evolutionary tree. Our results provide a general understanding of the foliar fungal mycobiomes from pteridophytes to angiosperms. These findings will facilitate our understanding of foliar fungal epiphytes and their roles in plant communities and ecosystems.

Community assembly and network structure of epiphytic and endophytic phyllosphere fungi in a subtropical mangrove ecosystem

“…At the class level, Dothideomycetes and Tremellomycetes were most dominant in both epiphytic and endophytic leaf fungal communities in our mangrove forests. Similarly, the pattern that Dothideomycetes was a predominant fungal class was also reported in other studies (Dong et al, 2021;Zhu et al, 2021). This may be explained by that Dothidiomycetes is the largest class of kingdom fungi, comprising most ecologically diverse of fungi (Kirk et al, 2008).…”

“…Due to phylogenetic conservatism of functional traits among host plants, plant phylogeny has been shown to play an crucial role in determining the community structure of phyllosphere endophytic fungi (Ricks and Koide, 2019;Darcy et al, 2020) and foliar epiphytic fungal microbiome (Zhu et al, 2021). However, it is still unknown how plant phylogenetic history affects phyllosphere epiphytic and endophytic fungal communities in mangrove forests.…”

Applying molecular and genetic methods to trees and their fungal communities

“…Such fungi may arrive at their places as part of aeromycota and may act in defeating pathogens present throughout the community of epiphytes, or as saprotrophs in preferred positions awaiting e.g. leaf and needle fall for rapid substrate colonization and decomposition (Bashir et al 2022;Lindow and Brandl 2003;Zhu et al 2021).…”

“…Such fungi may arrive at their places as part of aeromycota and may act in defeating pathogens present throughout the community of epiphytes, or as saprotrophs in preferred positions awaiting e.g. leaf and needle fall for rapid substrate colonization and decomposition (Bashir et al 2022 ; Lindow and Brandl 2003 ; Zhu et al 2021 ). Note that fungal organisms and the tree (northern red oak, Quercus rubra ) shown in the figure were randomly chosen for demonstrations from a selection of photos available and do not necessarily occur together in a natural phytobiome …”

Biotic filters driving the differentiation of decomposer, epiphytic and pathogenic phyllosphere fungi across plant species

“…The availability of massive sequencing techniques has opened the possibility to test ecological concepts and theories in this environment (Meyer and Leveau 2012). These techniques have revolutionized microbial ecology (Bokulich et al 2013, Zhu et al 2021), allowing studies under complex natural settings such as diverse plant communities. At the plant community level, recent studies are exploring potential drivers of phyllosphere fungal communities, such as the influence of seasonality (Copeland et al 2015), the spatial variability on a vertical canopy gradient (Izuno et al 2016) or the relation with the soil microbiota (Beule et al 2017).…”